Time mag: U.S. troops killed Iranian soldier in firefight last year

posted at 7:22 pm on March 30, 2007 by Allahpundit

U.S. News & World Report had this same story a week ago, identical in all respects (probably because they come from the same Army report) save for one critical detail — apparently, we killed one of their guys while he was in the act of firing an RPG. Yowza.

A short Army press release issued on the day of the skirmish offered the following information: U.S. soldiers from the 5th Squadron 73rd Cavalry 82nd Airborne were accompanying Iraqi forces on a routine joint patrol along the border with Iran, about 75 miles east of Baghdad, when they spotted two Iranian soldiers retreating from Iraqi territory back into Iran. A moment later, U.S. and Iraqi forces came upon a third Iranian soldier on the Iraqi side of the border, who stood his ground. As U.S. and Iraqi soldiers approached the Iranian officer and began speaking with him, a platoon of Iranian soldiers appeared and moved to surround the coalition patrol, taking up positions on high ground. At that point, according to the Army’s statement, the Iranian captain told the U.S. and Iraqi soldiers that if they tried to leave they would be fired on. Fearing abduction by the Iranians, U.S. troops moved to go anyway, and fighting broke out. Army officials say the Iranian troops fired first with small arms and rocket-propelled grenades, and that U.S. troops fell further back into Iraqi territory, while four Iraqi army soldiers, one interpreter and one Iraqi border guard remained in the hands of the Iranians.

The official release says there were no casualties among the Americans, and makes no mention of any on the Iranian side. U.S. soldiers present at the firefight, however, tell TIME that American forces killed at least one Iranian soldier who had been aiming a rocket-propelled grenade at their convoy of Humvees.

Verrry curious that U.S. News found out about this only last week, within 24 hours or so of the British sailors being kidnapped.

Speaking of which, are you sitting down? Because the Associated Press is about to rock. your. world.

The letters released by the Iranian government and attributed to the captive sailor have been increasingly strident and oddly written for a 26-year-old from southwest England, an indication that they were produced under duress, linguistics experts and psychologists said Friday….

“I would bet my house on the fact that this is basically Persian speakers who have written this,” Holes said. “This is very, very mannered English. … It’s stilted. It’s not natural.”

Holes also took issue with a passage from the third letter in which Turney describes her captors as “caring, compassionate, hospitable and friendly.”

“The same adjectives are used more or less in the other two letters, which leads me to believe they’ve been dictated,” he said.

Coming soon from the AP: a frame by frame analysis of today’s hostage tape that suggests there might have been another man in the room telling the sailor what to say.

I wish the AP hadn’t mentioned that about the letters being “stilted”. The service member involved could be doing that on purpose to get across the message that they are doing it under duress. AP’s exposure of this might result in additional stress on the service member as punishment by the captors. I wish the news media would report what the government says on this but PLEASE stop with the analysis because the Iranians are reading it too. AP could well get someone hurt, or worse.

Report what the government releases but please refrain from speculation and analysis for fundamental humanitarian reasons. PLEASE.

NARRATOR: But what really caused the Twin Towers to collapse? Was their failure inevitable? Or could they have stood longer, giving occupants and emergency crews a better chance for escape?

-snip-

NARRATOR: When a blue ribbon team of forensic engineers was asked by the government to determine exactly what triggered the Towers’ collapse, NOVA was there from the beginning, following their quest for answers

-snip-

NARRATOR: From their detailed examination of the Towers’ innovative design to the search for forensic evidence in the molecules of collapsed steel, the investigation team has studied every possible scenario. Could one tower have collapsed for different reasons than the other? Was there something about the Towers—built to maximize rental space—that traded safety for economy?

“The same adjectives are used more or less in the other two letters, which leads me to believe they’ve been dictated,” he said.

D’ya think so, Sherlock? I mean, you can’t be saying that the Iranians have turned the captured British sailors and Marines into meat puppets. That would so out of character for a regime that came into the world with a massive hostage-taking.

Oh, well, that explains everything then… they were told what to write and say.

o.O

To that I respond, “No $hit Sherlock!”

What I still fail to see, along with all the so-called experts (experts at stating the obvious but refusing to go the distance with their supreme observations), is even the slightest hint of resistance whether by word of mouth or hand or body language. Sure, the Iranians are probably telling the captives what horrible things might happen to them if they don’t capitulate willingly, but that doesn’t mean they actually willingly capitulate. The Iranians wouldn’t dare physically harm or kill any of them over such a benign event. They may be stupid savages reminiscent of some bizarro world backasswards Star Trek race of aliens, as evidenced by their entire history and the mere fact this event occured as it did, but I don’t believe the Iranians are even that stupid over something like allegedly straying a very short distance over an imaginary line in the water.

Catching foreign soldiers on dry land or dressed like uber-stealth spies carrying high explosives or laser-sighting equipment in the dead of night well within the Iranian waters might cause them to cross that line, but not this. We haven’t even seen the usual Iranian faux display of high tech weaponry and/or supplies accompanied by accusations of a sinister plot by the Brits to carry out some top secret mission in Iranian territory. Even so, by this time after so many letters and video bytes there should be some form of clandestine communication of some sort… and there’s diddly squat… zero… zip… na-da!

Yeah, okay, they’ll tell us their sordid story upon their repatriation, but they’re doing one hell of a job of telling us nothing given so many opportunities have presented themselves for them to do so thus far in so short a time. And to me, that’s a direct contradiction to all kinds of soldier training and standing orders.

We all need to face the fact that, sooner or later, we’re going to have to go bomb Iran back to the middle ages and change their regime. It’s not going to be pleasant, but clearly it’s going to have to be done.

I can’t wait to hear the crap that the Democrats are going to spew about why we shouldn’t, though. Sheesh.

“If Israel is left alone and the point of no return [in Iran’s nuclear weapons program] arrives, then Israel will have to do the job. But most probably we will not be able to do it with conventional warheads. And this is something the world should know.”
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“Once we reach the eve of destruction of a new Holocaust [from Iran], we will not think of anything else. We will be ready to destroy the nuclear infrastructure of Iran at whatever cost it takes. That means we will be ready to use unconventional weapons,” he said.